The Descendant of Hetman Polubotok, Ivan, who is forced to sell honey during the challenging early years of Ukraine’s independence, suddenly learns about his Cossack heritage. He is entrusted with a mission of national importance: to travel to Great Britain and reclaim the gold of his famous ancestor. According to legend, when Ukraine becomes independent, the treasure will belong to the one who knows the secret code word. However, the treasure is also being pursued by the KGB, mafia, CPSU, and the CIA.

Vadym Kastelli’s film “Hunt for the Cossack’s Gold” skillfully and effortlessly addresses the pressing questions posed by the formation of a new Ukrainian identity after 1991. Chief among these are: who were we, who have we become, and how consistent are these notions of “we”? In this context, “Hunt for the Cossack’s Gold” emerges as a possible example of an ironic incorporation of the negative Soviet experience into a cohesive national narrative.

At the same time, “Hunt for the Cossack’s Gold” is an ironic response to the widespread attempts to restore Cossack heritage in the early 1990s, when the idea of modern Ukrainians as direct descendants of Cossack hetmans was taken as self-evident. This time, however, the focus extended beyond symbolic capital to include very real dividends. Historian Serhii Plokhy, in his book “The Cossack Myth History and Nationhood in the Age of Empires”, says:  

“The belief in the existence of Polubotok’s gold was so strong and pervasive that in June 1990, during British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s visit to Kyiv, two members of the Verkhovna Rada, writers Volodymyr Yavorivsky and Roman Ivanychuk, submitted an official inquiry to the government to clarify the fate of the treasure.  

…If it were true, the amount of the deposit and the interest accrued over hundreds of years would reach astronomical figures — the Bank of England would face bankruptcy, Britain would be plunged into poverty, and the global financial system would collapse. Ukraine would have become the Kuwait of Eastern Europe.”

Ultimately, “Polubotok’s Gold” did not make Ukraine the Kuwait of Eastern Europe, but it did give us a comedy, whose eccentricity and self-irony underscore the turbulent times of state and nation-building in the first years of independence.  

One of the main songs in the film, “Hey, Ivan”, was written by the legendary band Braty Hadiukiny.